The present disclosure relates generally to information handling systems, and more particularly to a method and apparatus for information handling system sleep regulation.
As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
In conjunction with information handling systems, current processors and graphics controllers are implementing multiple performance modes where the device clock and voltage are both reduced in the lower performance state in order to reduce the power of the device. The devices also typically support an idle state where the voltage on the device is reduced to a very low voltage in order to reduce the leakage current when the device is basically doing no useful work. This requires a voltage regulator dedicated to the device implementing voltage reduced operation. Portable computers may have a large number of devices in such an idle state while in battery operation. The devices currently maintain full voltage and resultant leakage power because the cost of implementing individual power supplies for all devices is prohibitive.
One prior method for addressing the problem discussed above has been implemented for processors, through a reduced idle voltage provided by an Intel Mobile Voltage Positioning (IMVP) device and in particular, it's implementation of a reduced voltage idle state denoted as Deeper Sleep. However, this method has various disadvantages, for example, in that a number of other devices besides the processor may still be in a full voltage idle state while doing no useful work and resulting in poor power management.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide a method and apparatus for solving the problem of sleep regulation absent the disadvantages found in the prior methods discussed above.